About

Thu, 04/08/2010 - 5:26pm  ReLearnHistory.com

Philosophy:

ReLearnHistory.com is built in direct contrast three of the greatest assumed norms of history. All books were created in response to a very challenging series of questions. History books were designed to help transmit a particular perspective to their intended audience. Early on writing materials and the knowledge of how to write were scarcities. This caused histories to be condensed and shortened, rationing information for future generations. Even today with nearly unlimited virtual space many of the popular online encyclopedias adopt some method of triage. Too much of actual history has been, and is still being lost in this triage process. It's time for that to end.

The modern High School History Book is based upon chronology. It looks at a timeline and identifies which items took the most "time" on the timeline. It gives priority to talking about those issues that took longer, believing that time=significance. The reality is something different. Time does not equal significance. This is the first "norm" that has permeated our education system.

The over 10% unemployment that existed as a result of the progressive agenda of President Woodrow Wilson was addressed by his successor, Warren Harding. The Harding & Coolidge adminstrations made drastric reductions in the size of Government, and what might have been a "Great Depression" lead to a mild and short recession that ended with the "Roaring 20's." Of course, this occurred in under two years unlike the more than decade long "Great Depression" which each qualifies as an entry in the history books because it took up so much time. The efforts of Harding & Coolidge get forgotten, and the valuable lessons of history removed from the core of our citizen knowledge base.

The second "norm" that permeates the educational process of history is the devaluing of individual questions. Remember history books were designed to answer the "where did we come from" question? Well, even a basic study of history reveals a wide range of potential questions. Too often classroom size, and artificial learning timelines place emphasis on "speed teaching" instead of letting students learn by asking their own questions. For years now, each of us have had to put aside the questions we've had about our history and write papers, and study subjects that fit the teacher's curriculum requirements. What if you had the opportunity to learn history in an environment where your questions were considered legitimate?

Welcome, to ReLearnHistory.com.

Your answers are worth sharing. Your Questions are worth asking.

The final "norm" that we address here is justifiable distortion. Often times well intended powerful people will attempt to correct one of the mistakes of the past, by overemphasizing, mischaraterizing, or generalizing a particular historical event. Instead of letting the facts speak for themselves, they choose to highlight certain facts over others. One example is the idea that America hasn't been kind to racial diversity. I am not promoting the idea that America was perfect, but I challenge anyone to find a better example of racial diversity among a population the size of the United States. In both the modern or ancient worlds, the United States is certainly among the list of countries who did more "right things" with gender/racial diversity than "wrongs."

Policies to ensure the diversity of the American population is represented place "vignettes" into the history books. These distort the reality of our nation's history. Because this issue has been so over emphasized for so long people equate racial and gender differences with "diversity" completely ignoring that significant "diversity" is often seen in the diversity of opinion and thought, rather than gender or skin color. More people have been positively effected by the invention of the Light Bulb then ever participated in the "Underground Railroad," yet many books will reverse the significance of these two historical events. Here at this site, both are appropriate. We'll let the reader decide its significance. After all, regular people are smart too!

Often history is made up of regular people doing regular things. Echo Company, 506th Infantry Regiment was a significant military unit, and made a significant difference in the outcome of WWII. Yet, it wasn't until AFTER the book "Band of Brothers" emerged that the unit's history was recognized by other online encyclopedias. The reality is that each of our family trees have names of people who changed the course of history as individuals or as part of a movement. An unknown WWII Commander made decisions that cost and saved lives1. His life has significance to those he affected, and his biography is welcome here.

This is how history is made, and this is where you can record it, the same way it was made. This age of technology empowers mankind more than any other age. Here, we can use it to learn from history's lessons and truly provide the future our founders envisioned. We can't do that, until we expose the truth about our past. The truth, as YOU (not the elitests) see it, is welcome here.

Method:

ReLearnHistory.com believes that everyone's questions about the past are important. Our method for creating The Ultimate History Book involves answering everyone's questions. For more information see our Getting Started page.

The first Wednesday of each month ReLearnHistory.com will be hosting a "write-a-thon." Any topic, any question, the first Wednesday of the month will be your time to share what you know, or what you want to know.

Capitalism:

You'll notice this website has advertising on it. You might think that the website owners are somehow "wealthy" for advertising on such a popular website. You'd be wrong. Actually those of us who run this were told by our wives that doing another "volunteer non-profit" project wasn't allowed. We'd be in trouble with them if there was no hope of this benefitting our families' bottom line.

To ensure that our shameless attempt at capitalism doesn't become too obtrusive, we've decided to avoid other advertising companies and specifically stick with recommending books via amazon.com. We receive a "hefty" 4% of whatever books are recommended by this website. Even though we have some tremendous books in our book review section, and this is the most popular website I help manage. It still doesn't ammount to much, and quitting our day jobs isn't an option.

What's in it for Me?

Well, ReLearnHistory.com wants to have the most well researched articles as possible. To do this we need well-read authors. We are the only history website that allows its authors to make money off of their work. We do this by encouraging our authors to create an Amazon.com Associate account. We then ask them to link to their references via amazon.com. The associates' account allows them to receive a percentage back from every book purchased by their link. The more links, the more revenue. As part of the Terms of Service for this site, other users are not allowed to replace your link code with theirs, but they are certainly encouraged to increase the referencing and number of links to specific titles as possible. Refereces on The Forgotten Depression may serve as an example for authors inclined to contribute in this manner. Our Getting Started page has more information.

Media

Media inquiries should be directed to jacob {at} libertyhawk.net. Here are some quotes that may be useful:

It seems that historians have been using Chronological Significance as their standard for including things in text books. This means that the problems our society solves quickly, don't get mentioned at all, but the ones we exasperate do. It's like Forrest Gump saying "stupid is, as stupid does." It's like we only see the "stupid" parts of our past without critically questioning their effectiveness.

Architects:

This website was created by Joel Munn and Jacob Roecker. They regularly post on this site under the aliases WashingtonIsBroke and Liberty Hawk.